Beauty Blog

Tag: hair styling

Douglas Beauty SystemPerfect Complexion Exfoliating Cream: This is a case of not used up. It’s a washing cream with plastic particles that makes your skin smooth. But the particles are pretty harsh and I’m trying to be gentle with my face. So I had this lying about for a long time, thinking maybe I’ll want to use it someday. I finally admitted it won’t get used up so it had to go.

BiothermSkin-Best Serum-in-Cream: I remember testing the Serum-in-Oil from another Biotherm line and expecting it to be oily, but it turned out to be a gel texture. Well, this one here on the other hand, is totally oily. It’s not a thick cream texture, you only need a little dab for the whole face, but damn, when you spread it out it feels oily. It sinks in, so it doesn’t make you look bad, but the feeling is unusual. Also I don’t think it did anything for my skin at all. I used it with the matching day cream, which I haven’t used up yet, so it’ll be in the next post, but the pair was pointless if you ask me. Stick with the Blue Therapy serum if you like Biotherm.

Long and tiny list of ingredients for Serum-in-Cream.

Another Biotherm item: Creme Solaire Dry Touch SPF 30: This product has been reformulated sometime after my purchase so I’ll spare you a long review. Would not have repurchased, too dusty dry.

MACPrep&Prime CC Cream in Illuminate: The BBCC Hype may be over, but MAC created a solid product here. MAC, I have discovered, not only have great makeup, their skin care is also worth a look. This CC cream I consider a mix of both skin care and makeup. It has SPF 30 and is soothing on the skin, so after washing my face and adding a bit of moisture I go in straight with this one here, adding SPF and a smooth layer to apply my makeup on. It comes in several colors, I have the lavender one. It’s not the perfect color for me, as it doesn’t help with redness, but it makes such an elvish skin tone, lightening up the whole face. Also the other colors showed up too intense on my pale skin. I have repurchased the same color, Illuminate, but maybe one day I’ll check out the yellow color in hopes of it covering my redness…

BaleaUrea hand cream: good cream, but strong plasticky sweet smell. Will try to find one with lighter scent.

Ingredients for hand cream.

La Roche Posay Effaclar Duo +: really good cream with Salicylic Acid and Capryloyl Salicylic Acid. Used this every evening underneath my cream. Have not repurchased yet as I’ve got some other stuff to use up, but might. It cleanes the pores because of the lipophile acids. Good for acne and rosacea.

BatisteDry Shampoo Blonde: Not my first bottle and won’t stay the last bottle. Batiste gives me more volume than other dry shampoos I’ve tried. And dry shampoo in general gives me way more volume than hairspray (especially natural looking volume), which is why I go through bottle after bottle (and of course, you have to wash less often, too). Only downside to this Batiste one is that the smell is really strong. It’s vanilla which works when I wear vanilla-heavy perfume, but sometimes clashes badly with other perfume. However, I have since tried Batiste Classic and think it smells godawful, so I’ll be going back to Blonde next time.

Ingredients of dry shampoo.

That’s it, my empties for last month. 🙂 I am currently on a no-buy for all skin care, as I’ve way too much of it. Only exception is hand cream, since I use so much of it (neurotic hand washer).

Ah, sorry for the little hiatus there. My schedule keeps being upset and I can’t create when I don’t have a few hours of spare time in one go. 😦 Anyway, here is what I used up the last month, quite a few items:

Batiste Dry Shampoo light&blonde: this dry shampoo is colored. It comes out a muddy yellow. it totally works for my hair, but I’m not sure if it would work for a platinum blonde. You might end up with yellow patches! It does leave the scalp yellow, which is a bit annoying. The scent is vanilla, which is okay, but I’d highly prefer for hair products in general to be a lot less scented. They often compete with my perfume. But in general this is a good dry shampoo. It also creates volume, something I despereately need. The finish is duller than other dry shampoos might leave you, but I don’t care. Already repurchased.

Ingredients for Batiste Dry Shampoo.

ClarinsDaily Energizer Cleansing Gel: This is a case of not used up. I finally admitted to myself that foaming cleansers are really irritating for my skin. This particular product has a really nice smell, just like the matching cream, which I used up and reviewed before. But ultimately it’s not worth it. If you are the sort of person to use foaming cleaners you can find similar ones for less money.

This is my second empty MACMineralize Compact Foundation. It works really well for me. I have not repurchased yet, but I might. I just wish they offered a lighter color than NC15. I think I am really NC13 now.

Another handcream. I may be on a mission to try all the Balea ones… This is the Totes Meer handcream (dead sea salt). The texture is light and absorbs easily. The scent is light and unoffensive, a bit salty. Despite the light texture, it really helped keeping my skin moisturized. I have now purchased other hand creams that need to be used up, but I would totally repurchase this one. I just wish it came with SPF!

Ingredients. Click to see full size.

Absolute DouglasEndless lashes mini mascara: I will spare you the review because not only does this mascara not exist anymore, the whole brand has been discontinued at the end of 2015. I just took a pic of my fingers with the brush, because the brush is really super big. I kept on stabbing myself in the eye, or applying mascara to my brows on accident. 😐

MAC brow pencil Lingering: the quality is absolutely top notch. The color is brown, something that works for many people. But I am naturally very ashy and found this a tad too red to repurchase this particular color.

La Roche PosayRosaliac UV Legere: This is a cream with niacinamide (also written as nicotinamide, this is a derivate of vitamin B3). It has SPF 15, so first I used it as a day cream. It is tinted green, but too little to actually have effect, it’s just a gimmick. Despite being the legere version (there’s a riche one also) I found this cream very thick. And sadly, it left me looking incredibly greasy. It’s not that I was greasy (aka full of my own sebum) but this cream is just so shiny in not a god way. It was impossible to apply makeup on top. So I started using this as a night cream. And you know, in the long term it really worked. Short term I’d often get red in the face when I applied it. But long term, my acne and rosacea symptoms got so much less. My skin is calmer and better overall. But, because I really don’t need a greasy night cream with SPF I will not repurchase. Instead I am looking for creams with similar ingredients. Sadly I had not taken a pic of them before I threw the packaging away, so I can’t show them to you. Sorry. Basically I am looking for something with niacinamide, no alcohol, no perfume.

Then I used up a sample of YSLParis EdT. This is originally from the 80s and you can tell. I has a lot of notes, but I am overwhelmed by the powdery rose. Very rosey, very powdery. It was nice to test, but I’m not going to miss it.

Last item! I also used up the Kikokiss balm. This is very pigmented, comparable to a sheer lipstick. The balm had a lot of slick, it glides on very quickly. It made my lips feel good and look lovely. I am not sure if it had any long term benefits. It does come with SPF 15, though, which is good. I would recommend it for those who don’t want to put on lipstick and are looking for a colored balm instead. It’s too slick and too pigmented to use underneath lipstick even if you wiped most of it off again.

Wow, this was a mega post. In case anyone besides me finished reading all that, you deserve a cookie. 🙂

My first empty bottle in June was the BC Bonacure Oil MiracleVolume Amplifier. Like, it ran out on June, 1st, just a day too late for my previous empties post. 😐 I’m still not sure what this thing actually is, it comes out as a golden conditioner-like cream, but it’s a leave in product. It contains argan oil and no silicones. It was very useful, since it was sort of conditioning the hair and giving a little volume as well and being a leave in product, it’s faster than something you have to wash out. I liked it and might buy a full size.

DiadermineLift+ Hautverschönderndes Multi-Zonen Öl: This was a body oil in a spray bottle. At first I was super into it, it leaves the skin very soft. After a while it started to annoy me – the spray isn’t very directional and the oil ends up all over the place, including eyes and airways. 😦 Even when I put my hand right in front of the bottle, some of the oil ended up somewhere else. My mum also claims that the smell is terrible. Personally, I found the scent okay. But I wouldn’t buy another full size.

ClarinsCreme Eclat du Jour/Daily Energizer Cream: I also have the matching facewash. The Daily Energizer line has a very lovely scent. This particular cream is very rich, I would only recommend it for dry skin. It moisturizes well, but I did not notice anything else. It’s a completely regular face cream, apart from the nice smell you can get something similar for less money.

Figs & RougeMulti-Purpose Lip Balm Coco Rose: This was good. This was very good. I used it every day and it kept my lips soft and whole. The balm comes out a soft glossy pink with sparkle. This was pretty much the reason I did not use any lip gloss the last year. I’d just use this instead. I 100% recommend this, I only wish it had some sort of applicator or a better opening, because it comes out of the tube in a wide opening and I had to use my finger to apply.

Judith WilliamsPhytomineral Handcream: This a very rich hand cream with a thick texture in a bottle with a very small opening. Getting anything out is quite the muscle training. It was very good for my skin though. Operating touch screens is not possible after application, it needs a while to sink in.

Another Clarins, this time the Ultra Matte Rebalacing Lotion for oily skin: This is a lightweight mattifying cream. Despite being for oily skin, it did not feel drying on my cheeks. It’s the perfect summer face cream. It does mattify the skin, but if I used nothing else my nose would get shiny halfway through the day. There is also a version for combination skin, but since the version for oily skin has worked so well for me, I’d stick with it.

Daylong ultrasunscreen with SPF 25: I had several mini sizes and samples of this one. It goes on very lightweight and sinks into the skin fast. There is no greasy feeling afterwards. I could detect no scent, but the dog could (and kept on trying to lick it off). It comes out of the bottle yellow and while it hasn’t happened to me, it’s possible for this to stain clothes. Overall, it is a good product, but SPF 25 is too low for me. I also had one sample of the SPF 50 version for kids. That one has physical filters only (as kids sun screen always should) meaning that unlike the SPF 25, the 50 left a visible white cast on the skin. The texture of the SPF 50 was also harder to work in.

All in all, I would buy neither the SPF 25 nor the kids one, but I might check out their SPF 30 sunscreens sometime.

These were my June empties, if you made it down here, you get a virtual cupcake. 🙂

SumitaBrow Set: This is a clear brow wax pencil. I have not heard of this brand before.

DiadermineCC Cream: My first ever CC Cream! (I am expecting DD and EE Creams to be the break out items of 2015) So, for the uninitiated, CC stands for Color Corrective. Like BB Creams, CC Creams are all over the place in terms of what they do. For example, the Chanel CC Cream comes in only one color, yet it has pretty good skin colored pigmentation and can be used instead of a foundation. The new MAC CC Creams are colored primers (they come in soft colors like yellow or lavender), not much unlike their old colored primers. And this Diadermine Cream? It claims to be a day cream and make up base – so it’s a primer.

A dab of product proves that this is certainly not a foundation.

Spread out. It goes on colorless and is therefore fitting for everybody. I am not sure if you can see it here, but it has slight pinkish shimmer here and there. My verdict: this is an illuminating primer, hopefully with skin care benefits. I am deducting points for missing SPF, though. It claims to help with pigmentation, in my opinion this means there should also be SPF to prevent further pigmentation.

And last, NougatSparkling Body Shimmer: This contains 100 ml, the Glossybox card says the full size has 250 ml. The brand name Nougat gives me a total cross wire with the pinkish color. I have a Pavlovian reflex to the word Nougat. Excuse me while I go search for some chocolate.

I have decided to compare this Nougat Shimmer Body Lotion to my Soap&GloryGlow Lotion. They both have the same claims: nice smell and shimmer to put strategically on your body, like down your shins.

Aplying globs of product onto my arm: While Soap&Glory has a pump dispenser , Nougat has a wide opening to dip the lotion out and the lotion is very runny. I had to snap this pic very fast before the lotion ended up on the background.

This is Soap&Glory spread out on my arm. It leaves a slightly peachy shimmer.

And since I got way too much out of the Nougat one, I had to spread it pretty much all over. So this is an awkward shot of my upper arm. You can see that this NougatSparkling Body Shimmer leaves you pretty sparkly. I’d certainly not call this a shimmer. This is a sparklepire lotion.

Regarding the scents of these two lotions: Soap&Glory smells like Malibu Beach Barbie. The Nougat scent is a lot more subtle, a little rosy.

Overall, I am surprised by this box. The majority of it is pretty useful.

Same old, same old. September’s Glossybox is under the theme of Sugar&Spice. I love both sugary and spicy things and was eagerly awaiting the box and its insides.

Here’s what I got in the box (no box shot this time):

Another 20% off for Bodyshop (and a teaser of what was in the box)

This Syoss ad comes with a code that lets you order a hair dye of choice for free.

There’s also a Glossybox mag and some more ads.

Here we see the sugar of the box: The BodyshopHoneymania Body Butter. Smells deliciously of Honey. Yum.

The obligatory hair product is Osis+Blow & Go Smooth. It’s a spray for smoothing down hair and claims to make blow dry time shorter. Does anybody else think this product has a dirty-sounding name? full size.

bebe moreBrighten up moisturizer with SPF 10. I used to have bebe products as a teen, I loved the texture. normal bebe products are advertised towards teens, the new bebe more line targets an older demography. Looking forward to try. full size.

Be a bombshell cosmeticseye liner in onyx: sorry for the bad pic, too much black with too little light.

This is a felt tip liner with a thick tip. I burned out on felt tip liners, this is going to a friend. It’s full size (as eyeliners in Glossybox usually are).

Some squiggly lines on the back of my hand.

Last, but not least: the spice of the box: Aura by Swarovski. It’s a perfume with a distinct spicy note, but not heavy at all. A very elegant scent and it lasts very long on the skin.

Since they really did put a sugary and a spicy product in, I declare this month’s motto to be perfectly fulfilled.

Overall, it’s an okay box, but it doesn’t blow me away. I keep on getting hair sprays and it’s the fourth black liner I got from Glossybox (not even counting liners in other colors). On the other hand, all products are useful, so it’s not bad either.

Another month, another box! But before I dive into the new box I’d like to add to the last one which had the Emiteeye lash curler in it: this is the best eyelash curler I ever had and I never want to use another again!

So what was in the newest box?

Firstly, 20% off on body shop.

10 € off at Nägele&Strubell

Glossybox magazine. I’ve never seen this before. I guess it’s identical to the German one? Anyway, it’s pretty boring.

There was also a Zalando 5 € voucher that I did not take a picture of.

On to the interesting things:

Anatomicalsspray misty for me facial spritz. Did not have a facial spray yet, so it might be useful, but I’m a bit anxious about some of the ingredients.

It’s got lavender, witch hazel and peppermint in it (though all of those at the very end of the ingredients, so not very much of it). All of these are potentially irritating. I’ll try it on my arm and see what happens… witch hazel is a good ingredient btw, antibacterial and such, but I always find it too drying.

got2bÖl-la-la, a hair spray with argan oil? I’m not sure what to do with this one. (Argan oil is the very last ingredient in case you’re interested in that sort of thing)

the body shop100% natural lip roll on in orange: yes, useful. My burt’s bees lip balm was about to run out. I never had a lip roll-on before, I hope it’s not too much of a mess.

The box highlight: BiothermAquasource deep serum. The blue therapy serum impressed me a lot, I wonder how this one compares.

Jelly Pong Pong2in1 eyeliner & eyeshadow: I would have never bought such a 2 in 1 product on my own, but that’s what these boxes are for, right? I liked the jelly pong pong lipstick they sent in a box before very much, so I’ll give it a chance. The color I got is a dark forest green with barely visible shimmer.

Swatch: Two unblended lines and one blended line. Since the color is so dark I don’t think you can tell it’s not black on the eyes. It’s obviously most useful for a smokey eye. When I washed these lines off, they didn’t go off immediately. I didn’t need to wash several times, like I sometimes have to with very long lasting products, but it did last a little. I can’t say anything about wear time on the eyes yet.

Overall, it is a useful box in my opinion. Sure, I keep on accumulating hair styling products, since I don’t really use them and I’m not yet 100% sure about the facial mist, but I think it’s a good box. All products except the Biotherm one are full size by the way. My wish for future boxes would be less full sized products and a little more glamour, though.

The design is so lovely. That alone won me over already. I forgot to snap a pic of the paper inside but it is also very lovely.

First look.

Beauty BirdFly High! Active Foot Gel: this is a full size of 75 ml. So this is a gel with menthol and eucalyptus and it’s supposed to refresh your feet. I already used it yesterday since it was very hot and that always makes my feet red and warm. It does feel good, no burn or anything, sadly it only feels cool the very first second.

DaylongSunscreen SPF 25: Since last box included an after sun product, I have been waiting for the sunscreen. This is a tester size of 30 ml. It claims to be water resistant. Daylong is a new line, I have only seen it the last few months. It is only sold in pharmacies. I used this yesterday when I was out swimming, and so far I can’t detect any sunburn despite my ridiculously pale skin color. I reapplied it after swimming; water resistant is nice and fine while you’re in the water, but it’s better to reapply afterwards.

Emite MakeupEyelash Curler: So, this is an eyelash curler and it comes with four refill pads. More refills is good I guess, often you get only one. But I have a question to you, my knowledgeable readers: how often do you need to replace your pads? I’m sort of still on the first pad of my first curler.

What strikes me as the most interesting about this particular curler is the price Glossybox lists: 23,60 €. Like, what? Cheap curlers are about 3 or4 €. I own one I considered to be super expensive: it’s the Shiseido one and cost me 19 €. What can this Emite one do that makes it worth that price? Is this Glossybox strategy to list super high prices to make us feel like we get a lot of worth for our box money? ^_^”

Next, another full size (200 ml) that almost didn’t fit in the box: got2bstrand nixe texturierendes Salz-Spray: I’m not much of a hair styling person, so I have never heard of a salt spray. Usually I’d think salt is what you have to wash out of your hair, not add in after washing it. But alright. It looks fascinating. It is supposed to give you nice beach waves. Sadly my hair is as straight as if I’d used a flat iron every hour of the day and the description already said that for straight hair you should use a curler first. So, I’m not sure how useful this thing is to me. I think it would work nice on a person with wavy hair to make the waves more pronounced.

And finally the highlight of the box: nails inc.Brook Street nail polish

This is a mini size of 5 ml. I’m a big fan of nails inc and this is the perfect summery color. Well, mini size, it’s half the size of a normal nails inc polish which is 10 ml. Still, it looks so cute and tiny! Hopefully the small brush will work for me.

So, this was the box. What do you think? The box will be my new jewellery box or something; it’s so pretty. I think the insides are mostly useful, too.

It’s not underneath this ugly bag either. There is no box. The box is a lie!

So I bring you the insides of this months Glossysackerl (Glossytüte for my German readers):

Kiehl’sPowerful Strength Line Reducing Concentrate

Great I’ve been wanting to try Kiehl’s for a while.

Kiehl’sLine-Reducing Eye-Brightening Concentrate

Yes, okay I’ve been wanting an eye cream and it’s another Kiehl’s, but seriously? Am I paying for a sachet here? That’s not very glam.

As an extra, there is a tester of Lancome’sLa vie est belle. It’s a strong and sweet scent.

Da Vinci cosmeticsMineral shimmer Powder.

In the color Earth. It looks to be loose shimmer powder that you can apply wherever you want. Sadly I’m not a big fan of loose powder, but who knows maybe this one will convince me otherwise.

BC BonacureOil Miracle Volume Amplifier 5

I looooved the shampoo of that line, very psyched to try this. But what is it? How do I use it? It says to create volume, but how? Where do I put it and when? Don’t be so cryptic in your descriptions.

EucerinSun Fluid SPF 30

Sun protection for the face, mattifying too! And right as we (hopefully) go out of winter. Yes, great.

BiothermBlue Therapy Serum

This has been in Glossybox before and I didn’t get it in my box and I was so bummed. But now I got it! Except… did I just get three wrinkle creams in one box? Do I look that old? ;_;

Finally, the good, the bad and the ugly:

The good: I like all the brands (the only one I do not know is Da Vinci, so I can’t say I like that one yet), overall a great good result in products.

The bad: The mix of sample and full sizes is pretty good. The sun cream is a full size of 50ml and I think the shimmer powder is a full size too, the rest are samples. In general I am a fan of sample sizes, not one of those who want lots of full sizes in their Glossybox. I am paying for luxury-sized samples and that’s what I want. YET – a sachet of eye cream? I can get sachets of cream for free, you know. I just need to ask for them in the store. Yes I know that eye cream was the sixth product in the bag, I can count. But they sold this month’s Glossybox with the tag “SIX products in one box!”, so… Honestly, if you hadn’t said that and added it as an extra, I would not even mention it.

The ugly: What’s with this five year old kid’s gym bag? I want a pretty box, with bow and paper that I can unwrap. Unboxing and unwrapping is half the fun of glossybox! I also repurpose those boxes, they are wonderful for storage (and for gifts). Hopefully this will not happen again, as this month’s theme seems to have been “travel”, so it was a “travel bag”. Not even going to mention that for a travel edition I wouldn’t need three wrinkle creams…

Nagging aside, I think the products are pretty good. If it had come in a box, it would have been among my best boxes so far. What are your opinions on this box?

Hi, folks! Today I would like to talk to you about the BC BonacureMoisture Kick Spray Conditioner that came in my Valentine’s Glossybox.

Firstly there seems to be a typo in the name. I’m pretty sure it should be “Spray Glue” instead of conditioner, because that’s most certainly what it does. It glued my hair together. I couldn’t properly brush my hair for a week! This thing goes straight to the trash, good riddance!

Secondly, actually there is no secondly. That’s all I have to say on this topic. I was pretty disappointed, because I’ve had a really great shampoo by this brand and didn’t expect this spray to be so bad.

At least the peeling, the face cream and the body lotion that came with this box were pretty rad.

Wow, my Glossybox came early! Usually when it’s sent off on Thursday I get it Monday or Tuesday. So here’s my immediate reaction post! It’s probably completely pointless writing this in English, seeing as it’s the Austrian edition of this box, but what can you do. Not about to switch languages in the middle of this blog.

The inside of my box. I was half asleep when I took these pics, the mailman woke me up. So what have we got here?

Elite Models Liner Perfection

A liquid liner with a felt tip. I strongly prefer felt tip liners over other liquids. The tip is super flexible, you’ll see what kind of lines you can make with this is my swatch pic. It’s not smudgeable, but it bleeds. It bleeds a lot, so I probably cannot wear it without a dark shadow in my crease to hide that. It’s a full size; the card says it costs 8,90 €.

Clarins Hydra Quench Cream

This is a sample size of 15 ml. I’d say you can barely ever go wrong with Clarins creams. I can’t wait to try it! Card says full size is 40,50 € per 50 ml.

GOT2B iStylers TEXTURE Clay

Ok I have no clue what a texture clay is supposed to be. Let’s take a look inside.

It smells nice, not too strong. I’m still not sure what to do with it? It’s a styling paste, anyway. It’s a full size; 6,29 € for 75 ml.

I remember having had Aok face products against acne; I think they were were similar to the Clinique ones, only cheaper. I was going to buy a tinted moisturizer anyway, so I’ll try this instead. At first glance it’s too dark for me, but it blends lighter. Probably going to make bronzed look for this. If you’re even lighter than me (I’m between MAC NC 15 and NC 20) this is too dark. It’s probably good for NC 20 and upwards.

Now, what I expect from a BB Cream is lots: good coverage, moisture, sun protection; it should be better than tinted moisturizers, but let’s face it: here in Europe BB Cream is mostly the new name for tinted moisturizer. 😐 I’ll keep you updated on this one. I can already tell you one flaw of this product: it does not list a Sun Protection Factor! All BB Creams should have one, and not too low. Now, a look at the ingredients tells me that it has Titanium Dioxide and three different Iron Oxides. This means in my books that there is SPF in it, but it’s not listed anywhere on the product. I’m 75% sure that’s against some kind of packaging regulations here in the EU?

It’s a full size, 7,99 € for 50 ml.

Swatches: two different kind of lines with the liquid liner. Someone not clumsy can surely make art with it. Not me, though. The brown blob is the lip liner. It’s not as creamy as it could be. I must see how it is on my lips later.

The BB Cream; right unblended, left blended. A little bit goes a long way here; it’s going to take ages to use this up. Sadly, you can clearly see the difference to my skin tone. I can only use this to make myself darker. I might end up not using this at all.

All in all, this box came with 4 full sizes and is well worth the 18 € you pay for it. However, of the boxes I got so far it’s nowhere near among my favorites. I can only say for sure that I’ll use the Clarins cream. But maybe I will be surprised. Last box came with a concealer by Cosline that looked way to dark and its packaging fell apart at one nudge. Yet I carry it in my bag every day, because it turned out to be surprisingly useful and blendable.